This book presents an introduction to the structure and representation theory of modular Lie algebras over fields of positive characteristic. It introduces the beginner to the theory of modular Lie algebras and is meant to be a reference text for researchers.

The Lie Theory Workshop, founded by Joe Wolf (UC, Berkeley), has been running for over two decades. At the beginning, the top universities in California and Utah hosted the meetings, which continue to run on a quarterly basis. Experts in representation theory/Lie theory from various parts of the US, Europe, Asia (China, Japan, Singapore, Russia), Canada, and South and Central America were routinely invited to give talks at these meetings. Nowadays, the workshops are also hosted at universities in Louisiana, Virginia, and Oklahoma. These Lie theory workshops have been sponsored by the NSF, noting the talks have been seminal in describing new perspectives in the field covering broad areas of current research. The contributors have all participated in these Lie theory workshops and include in this volume expository articles which will cover representation theory from the algebraic, geometric, analytic, and topological perspectives with also important connections to math physics. These survey articles, review and update the prominent seminal series of workshops in representation/Lie theory mentioned above, and reflects the widespread influence of those workshops in such areas as harmonic analysis, representation theory, differential geometry, algebraic geometry, number theory, and mathematical physics. Many of the contributors have had prominent roles in both the classical and modern developments of Lie theory and its applications.

The study of the structure of Lie algebras over arbitrary fields is now a little more than thirty years old. The first papers, to my know ledge, which undertook this study as an end in itself were those of JACOBSON (" Rational methods in the theory of Lie algebras ") in the Annals, and of LANDHERR ("Uber einfache Liesche Ringe") in the Hamburg Abhandlungen, both in 1935. Over fields of characteristic zero, these thirty years have seen the ideas and results inherited from LIE, KILLING, E. CARTAN and WEYL developed and given new depth, meaning and elegance by many contributors. Much of this work is presented in [47, 64, 128 and 234] of the bibliography. For those who find the rationalization for the study of Lie algebras in their connections with Lie groups, satisfying counterparts to these connections have been found over general non-modular fields, with the substitution of the formal groups of BOCHNER [40] (see also DIEUDONNE [108]), or that of the algebraic linear groups of CHEVALLEY [71], for the usual Lie group. In particular, the relation with algebraic linear groups has stimulated the study of Lie algebras of linear transformations. When one admits to consideration Lie algebras over a base field of positive characteristic (such are the algebras to which the title of this monograph refers), he encounters a new and initially confusing scene.

Solid but concise, this account of Lie algebra emphasizes the theory's simplicity and offers new approaches to major theorems. Author David J. Winter, a Professor of Mathematics at the University of Michigan, also presents a general, extensive treatment of Cartan and related Lie subalgebras over arbitrary fields. Preliminary material covers modules and nonassociate algebras, followed by a compact, self-contained development of the theory of Lie algebras of characteristic 0. Topics include solvable and nilpotent Lie algebras, Cartan subalgebras, and Levi's radical splitting theorem and the complete reducibility of representations of semisimple Lie algebras. Additional subjects include the isomorphism theorem for semisimple Lie algebras and their irreducible modules, automorphism of Lie algebras, and the conjugacy of Cartan subalgebras and Borel subalgebras. An extensive theory of Cartan and related subalgebras of Lie algebras over arbitrary fields is developed in the final chapter, and an appendix offers background on the Zariski topology.

Over the past 30 years, exciting developments in diverse areas of the theory of Lie algebras and their representations have been observed. The symposium covered topics such as Lie algebras and combinatorics, crystal bases for quantum groups, quantum groups and solvable lattice models, and modular and infinite-dimensional Lie algebras. In this volume, readers will find several excellent expository articles and research papers containing many significant new results in this area.